Early years

Clinton was born in Little Rock, Arkansas, on February 27, 1980. Chelsea's name was inspired by a visit to the Chelsea neighborhood of London during a Christmas 1978 vacation. Hillary said that upon hearing the 1969 Judy Collins recording of the Joni Mitchell song, "Chelsea Morning", Bill remarked, "If we ever have a daughter, her name should be Chelsea."[2][3][4]

When Chelsea was two years old, she accompanied her parents as they campaigned throughout Arkansas for her father's gubernatorial race.[2] She learned to read and write at a very young age. Chelsea claims that she started reading the newspaper by the age of three and also wrote a letter to President Ronald Reagan when she was only five years old.[5] In the letter, which was photocopied and preserved by her father, she asked President Reagan not to visit a military cemetery in West Germany, where Nazi soldiers were buried.[5] Chelsea attended Forest Park Elementary School, Booker Arts and Science Magnet Elementary School and Horace Mann Junior High School, both Little Rock public schools.[6] She skipped the third grade.[7]

Hillary Clinton followed the advice of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis on raising children in the White House, and asked the press to limit coverage of Chelsea to her participation in public events such as state visits.[3]Margaret Truman, daughter of former president Harry S. Truman, supported the Clintons, and in March 1993 wrote a letter to the editor of The New York Times about the damage that could be done if the press made Chelsea a subject of intense coverage.[10]

Journalists debated the issue of allowing Clinton to retain her privacy. Most media outlets concluded that she should be off-limits due to her age, although Rush Limbaugh[9] and Saturday Night Live both broadcast material mocking her appearance.[11] During this phase of her life, her father said, "We really work hard on making sure that Chelsea doesn't let other people define her sense of her own self-worth ... It's tough when you are an adolescent ... but I think she'll be ok."[12]

The Clintons' decision to remove Chelsea from public schooling and send her to Sidwell Friends School, a private school in Washington, D.C., drew criticism.[9] While several children of sitting presidents have attended Sidwell, the most recent prior child, Amy Carter, had gone to D.C. public schools. In a 1993 CBS This Morning town meeting, Bill defended the choice, stating that Chelsea did not like "getting a lot of publicity" and would have "more control over her destiny" at Sidwell. Bill explained that they made their decision in an effort to protect Chelsea's privacy; they did not "reject the public schools."[13] Sidwell's students and staff remained silent regarding Chelsea, declining to discuss her publicly.[9] A veteran of Model United Nations,[14] Clinton was a 1997 National Merit Scholarship semifinalist.[15] She graduated from Sidwell Friends in 1997; her father spoke at the graduation ceremony.[16]

Following Chelsea's high school graduation, media speculation regarding her choice of college resulted in heavy press coverage. She ultimately chose to attend Stanford University. During her father's eight years in office, there were 32 stories in The New York Times and 87 network news stories about Chelsea. Of all presidential children preceding her, she received the most television coverage.[17]

Although her father is a Southern Baptist, Clinton was raised in her mother's Methodist faith.[18] She attended Foundry United Methodist Church on 16th Street, NW in Washington and met with other teens on Sunday mornings to examine questions of faith, philosophy, and issues of concern to her age group. Her parents joined her at the youth group's parent-teen round tables. An adult group leader thought Clinton to be "a terrific kid" and observed that she was treated as an equal in the group. Away from church, her social activities included visits to a Planet Hollywood restaurant with friends and sleep-overs in and out of the White House. President Clinton sometimes joined her and her sleep-over friends for breakfast.[9]

At age four, Clinton had begun taking dance classes in Arkansas,[19] and she continued her dance training at the Washington School of Ballet for several years. In her book, It Takes a Village, Hillary wrote that Bill was disappointed when Chelsea quit softball and soccer to concentrate on ballet, but he was nonetheless supportive, regularly attending her performances.[9] She was cast in the role of the Favorite Aunt[20] in the 1993 Washington Ballet production of Tchaikovsky's The Nutcracker.[9][21]

In early 1999, the Clintons learned of an article being planned by People that examined the First Family's relationships in the wake of scandals and the impending vote on President Clinton's impeachment. The Secret Service told the magazine that they had concerns that the story could compromise Chelsea's security. People decided to run the story anyway, and Bill and Hillary issued a statement expressing their regret and sadness. Carol Wallace, People managing editor, affirmed the magazine's sensitivity to the Clintons' concerns, but felt 19-year-old Chelsea was "an eyewitness to family drama and historical events" and thus "a valid journalistic subject". The article, entitled "Grace Under Fire", was published in February 1999 with a cover photo of Chelsea and Hillary.[22]

During the last year of her father's presidency, Chelsea assumed some White House hostess responsibilities when her mother was campaigning for the U.S. Senate, traveling with her father on several overseas trips and attending state dinners with him.[23]

Education and academic life

Stanford University

The week before she arrived on campus, her mother published an open letter in her syndicated column asking journalists to leave her daughter alone. Chelsea arrived at Stanford in a motorcade with her parents, Secret Service agents, and almost 250 journalists. For her security, bullet-proof glass was installed in her dorm windows and surveillance cameras were placed in hallways. Secret Service agents in plain clothes lived in her dorm.[26] With the exception of an occasional tabloid story written about her, Chelsea's four years at Stanford remained out of public view.[27]

Clinton obtained a B.A. degree in history, with highest honors, at Stanford in 2001.[24][27] The topic of her 167-page senior thesis was the 1998 Good Friday Agreement in Northern Ireland, advised by Jack Rakove.[27][28] At the time of Chelsea's graduation, President Clinton issued a statement saying, "Hillary and I are grateful for the friendships and great learning experiences Chelsea had at Stanford, and we are very proud of her on this special day."[29]

University of Oxford

In July 2001, President Clinton revealed that Chelsea would be pursuing a master's degree at University College of the University of Oxford later that year – the same college where he studied politics between 1968 and 1970 on a Rhodes Scholarship;[30] Chelsea did not apply for a Rhodes Scholarship. Lord Butler of Brockwell, the Master of University College, said: "Her record at Stanford shows that she is a very well-qualified and able student. The college is also pleased to extend its link with the Clinton family." Upon the recommendation of British and American advisers, the university implemented security measures,[31] and fellow students were asked not to discuss her with the press.[32]

Arriving at Oxford just after the September 11 attacks, Clinton was drawn to other American students who were also feeling the emotional after-effects of the trauma. She told Talk magazine:

Every day I encounter some sort of anti-American feeling. Over the summer, I thought I would seek out non-Americans as friends, just for diversity's sake. Now I find that I want to be around Americans – people who I know are thinking about our country as much as I am.[32]

Clinton was criticized for those remarks in the London press and by the newspaper Oxford Student, which angered the university by directly attacking her in an editorial. However, people who met Clinton at that time described her as charming, poised and unaffected, and she seemed to be adjusting successfully to life abroad. During her time at Oxford, Chelsea adopted a more sophisticated look, reportedly assisted by a family friend, Donatella Versace, whose couture shows she attended in early 2002. Geordie Greig, the editor of Tatler, ranked her number five on the magazine's 2002 "Top 10 Girls" list.[32]

In 2003, Clinton completed an MPhil degree in international relations at Oxford.[33] Her 132-page thesis was titled The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria: A Response to Global Threats, a Part of a Global Future, supervised by Jennifer Welsh and Ngaire Woods.[34] Following her graduation, she returned to the United States.[24]

Columbia University and New York University

Starting in 2010, Clinton began serving as Assistant Vice-Provost for the Global Network University of New York University, working on international recruitment strategies.[37] She is the co-founder of the Of Many Institute for Multifaith Leadership at NYU and serves as its co-chair.[44] By 2010, she was also pursuing PhD coursework at NYU's Wagner School of Public Service, but later transferred back to Oxford in 2011 to complete her dissertation.[36][45]

In November 2011, NBC announced that they had hired Clinton as a special correspondent. One of her roles was reporting feature stories about "Making a Difference" for NBC Nightly News and Rock Center with Brian Williams. It was a three-month contract and allowed her to concurrently continue working for the Clinton Foundation and pursue her education.[49][50] Clinton's first appearance was on the December 12, 2011, episode of Rock Center.[51] Although she received some negative critical reviews for her work, Clinton's contract with NBC was renewed in February 2012.[52][53]Rock Center ended in May 2013, and she left the network in August 2014.[54][55] Clinton reportedly earned an annual salary of $600,000 for her work at NBC.[56]

In September 2015, Clinton made her authorial debut with It's Your World: Get Informed, Get Inspired and Get Going!, which was published by Philomel Books. The 400-page book is aimed at middle school students (ages 10 to 14) and introduces them to a range of social issues, encouraging them to take action to make the world a better place.[57]The Today Show gave Clinton a full segment in which to discuss the book with her former colleagues at NBC.[58] The book received mixed reviews from critics, who lauded Clinton for her effort but "lament[ed] its didactic tone".[57][59][60]

In May 2017 Clinton published her sophomore authorial work, a children's book entitled, She Persisted. Upon its release, the book became a bestseller.[61]

While campaigning, Clinton answered audience questions but did not give interviews or respond to press questions,[68] including one from a nine-year-old Scholastic News reporter asking whether her father would be a good "first man".[69] She replied, "I'm sorry, I don't talk to the press and that applies to you, unfortunately. Even though I think you're cute."[70]Philippe Reines, her mother's press secretary, intervened when the press attempted to approach Chelsea directly.[69]

When MSNBC reporter David Shuster characterized Clinton's participation in her mother's campaign as "sort of being pimped out", the Clinton campaign objected. Shuster subsequently apologized on-air and was suspended for two weeks.[71][72]

The first time she was asked about her mother's handling of the Lewinsky scandal at a campaign stop Clinton responded, "I do not think that is any of your business."[67] As she became a more experienced campaigner, she refined her responses and deflected questions on the issue with comments such as, "If that's what you want to vote on, that's what you should vote on. But I think there are other people [who are] going to vote on things like healthcare and economics."[67][73]

Clinton Foundation

Clinton speaking at a campaign rally for her mother in the 2016 presidential election.

Since 2011, Clinton has taken a prominent role at the family's Bill, Hillary & Chelsea Clinton Foundation,[75] and has had a seat on its board.[1] As part of her work, she gives paid speeches to raise money with her fees going directly to the foundation, whose goals relate to improving global health, creating opportunities for women, and promoting economic growth. A spokesperson for the foundation told The New York Times in 2014 that her speeches "are on behalf of the Clinton Foundation, and 100 percent of the fees are remitted directly to the foundation".[76][77]

Following their wedding, the couple lived in New York City's Gramercy Park neighborhood for three years [79] and later purchased a condominium in the NoMad district of Manhattan for $10.5 million.[81] Their daughter, Charlotte Clinton Mezvinsky, was born in September 2014,[82] and their son, Aidan Clinton Mezvinsky, was born in June 2016.[83][84] Shortly after Aidan was born, the family moved to the nearby Flatiron District.[85]

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